The present invention relates to a mounting member for a disk brake suitably used to apply braking force to a vehicle, for example, and also relates to a method of producing the disk brake mounting member. More particularly, the present invention relates to an improvement in a disk brake mounting member whereby disk brake mounting members to be installed on the right and left sides, respectively, of a vehicle are surely prevented from being erroneously installed on the wrong side.
A generally known disk brake includes a mounting member having a pair of arms spaced apart from each other in the circumferential direction of a disk. The pair of arms extend over the outer periphery of the disk in the axial direction of the disk. A caliper is slidably supported by the arms of the mounting member so as to extend over from one side to the other side of the disk between the arms. The disk brake further includes a pair of inner and outer friction pads adapted to be pressed against both sides of the disk by the action of a piston slidably fitted in a cylinder provided in the caliper.
In this type of conventional disk brake, when a braking operation is initiated, the piston provided in the cylinder of the caliper is caused to slide toward the disk by the externally supplied hydraulic pressure. The whole caliper slides toward the inner side of the disk relative to the mounting member, thereby pressing the friction pads against both sides of the disk between the piston and the outer side of the caliper. Thus, applying braking force is applied to the disk.
The mounting member has a portion fixed to a non-rotating portion of a vehicle at one side of the disk. A pair of left and right arms are located outside the fixed portion as viewed in the radial direction of the disk. The left and right arms are spaced apart from each other in the circumferential direction of the disk. A pair of left and right pin holes are formed in the left and right arms, respectively, with different bore diameters. The left and right pin holes are fitted with sliding pins, respectively, which support the caliper slidably in the axial direction of the disk.
There is a known mounting member wherein the left and right pin holes are formed with different bore diameters to make the clearance for the sliding pin in one pin hole larger than that in the other pin hole. Therefore, the caliper can smoothly slide in the axial direction of the disk even when the torque from the disk acts on the arms of the mounting member during a braking operation or the like such that the arms, together with the pin holes, are elastically deformed in the rotational direction of the disk.
Incidentally, the above-described conventional technique suffers from the problem that when pin holes with different bore diameters are to be formed in the left and right arms of the mounting member, the way of machining to form pin holes must be reversed according to whether the mounting member to be machined is for a right wheel or for a left wheel. Accordingly, it takes time and labor to drill pin holes, and erroneous machining is likely to occur.
Upon installing a caliper on a mounting member or upon mounting a mounting member on a non-rotating portion of a vehicle, erroneous mounting is likely to occur because the mounting orientation of a mounting member for a right wheel and that for a left wheel are opposite to each other. Accordingly, the working efficiency in such a mounting operation degrades.
To solve such problems, according to another conventional technique, mounting members to be used for right and left wheels, respectively, are molded by using different molds. Therefore, when pin holes are to be drilled in a mounting member or when a caliper is to be installed on a mounting member, the operator can readily see whether the mounting member concerned is one for a right wheel or one for a left wheel by visual check. Thereby, the above-described erroneous drilling of pin holes or erroneous installation of a caliper is prevented.
In such a case, however, it is necessary to prepare a mold for a mounting member for a right wheel and another mold for a mounting member for a left wheel because the mounting members to be used for right and left wheels, respectively, have different shapes. Therefore, it takes time and labor to produce and manage molds for forming mounting members of different shapes, and management and other costs undesirably increase.